On The Road With Romford – Part One – Wroxham

Supporting a football team is not only about winning trophies. Sure, that’s what all clubs, and all of their fans, want, but realistically only a handful of teams are every likely to win the Premier League or the FA Cup. In fact, at all levels there are only a few teams that will realistically challenge for silverware. The rest may dream, but for their fans it isn’t always about winning pots, it’s about the memories.

Going to football is not just about the ninety minutes in my view. I would hate to just go to a game, watch it alone and go home again. Football is for me, as much about meeting friends, and sometimes the trip, if it’s an away game.

As a diversion from current events, I thought that I would take a trip down memory lane, and revisit some of the away games that I have experienced watching Romford, and to prove that it’s not just the wins that create memories, this first one is from a snowy night in Norfolk when Romford took a bit of a pasting.

Wroxham, on The Norfolk Broads, is a nice place to visit when the weather is good. I’ve been there on a boating holiday on The Broads back in 1975, and went there again for lunch en route to Norwich last summer. 

When Wroxham were promoted to Romford’s division of the Isthmian League in 2012, I had hoped that Boro would get to go there either right at the start, or right at the end, of the season so that I might be able to combine a few days on the water with going to the match. No such luck; during the five seasons that the sides shared a division, every trip to Wroxham was between October and early March.

In 2012, Romford were scheduled to go to Wroxham on the Saturday before Christmas, but the weather put paid to that, and the game was rearranged for Tuesday 5^th February 2013. As was the norm for trips of that distance – it’s 120 miles from Romford to Wroxham – there was a coach organised for players and supporters (more normally, players and supporters travel to games independently).

With snow forecast, it was with some trepidation that we set off for Norfolk on an evening that now has a firm place in Romford FC folklore.

As the coach approached Ipswich the first sprinkling of snow began to fall and by the time we reached the outskirts of Norwich it was beginning to become quite heavy. Phone conversations with both the home club and our counterparts from Thurrock FC, who were on their way to Lowestoft, suggested that it was touch and go as to whether either game would be played. Thurrock's trip to England's most easterly town proved to be in vain with a snowbound pitch ruling out any play, while a number of Football League games, and Leicester City’s FA Cup tie against Huddersfield Town also succumbed, how would Romford’s game fare?

There was much speculation on the coach as to whether we thought the game would be played, and by the time we got to Wroxham, a bit later than planned, at about 6.30pm, it seemed from a call from the home club’s secretary, that the game was off.

We arrived at Wroxham’s Trafford Park ground to see a pitch covered with a light dusting of snow and the referee disinclined to allow the game to proceed. Given that we had just travelled 120 miles, we were all reluctant to turn around and go home, so the kit was unloaded and everyone trooped into the clubhouse while Romford’s manager Paul Martin and his Wroxham counterpart discussed the state of the pitch with the referee, who fortunately (albeit reluctantly) gave the go ahead for play to start. It has to be said that his agreeing to start the game came with the proviso that he would abandon proceedings if it got farcical. As it happened, the snow relented and what remained was just a fine dusting that got trodden into the pitch as the game progressed; if there was any reason for the game to be halted it would have been that the pitch became increasingly waterlogged.

Selected pages from the match programme

It was a very cold night, and that, combined with the fact that the game had been doubt, probably made up many of the local supporters’ minds and convinced them that a night in front of the TV was preferable. As a result, there were just 75 in the crowd, with about twenty of those from Romford, some who had been on the coach, and some who had travelled independently.

As football matches go, this was not one to enjoy from a Romford perspective. Wroxham took the lead after 23 minutes and made it two just before half-time. Romford had a goal disallowed just after the interval, but that was as good as it got as Wroxham scored three more to win 5-0, although their last came in the 66^th minute.

A rare moment of pressure from Romford (Blue & Yellow stripes). Photo: TGS

Romford goalkeeper Atu Ngoy fell ill towards the end of the game, and had to be replaced, with striker Nick Reynolds taking over between the posts. Romford’s substitute for Ngoy was assistant manager Mark Lord, who extended his own record as Romford’s oldest player at the age of 46. He later went on to break his own record again when he came on as a substitute, aged 48, against Redbridge in 2015.

Having applauded our team off with numbed hands, we repaired to the clubhouse to warm up, although whether having a cold beer was a good idea is moot. As is so often the case in non-League football, the hospitality from the home club was first class and the food that they shared with us – sausages and bubble & squeak – was most welcome. Wroxham was one of those places that was always a pleasure to visit, whether we won, lost or drew, and despite the distance I’m sorry that they got relegated in 2017; we may not get another chance to go there.

At the end of that freezing cold night in February, we all got back on the coach and went home, it would have been after one o’clock by the time I put the key in the door, after a 240 mile round trip and a 5-0 defeat, but a night I won’t forget, one of those trips that despite the result, make following a team memorable.